Talk:Emily Grace/@comment-32546039-20170711161456
Living in Australia I am very late comer to Murdock and started watching it as a boxed set (given as a gift from a Canadian friend). The boxed set has seasons 1-9 and I am not sure when I will see/watch season ten, I got hooked and have been watching it during my spare time over the last 3 months and so I seen the series (for me) develop over a short period and not the ten or so years it’s been on the air. Getting to the point: George Crabtree and Emily Grace (and Lillian Moss). The characters are allowed to develop (or not) and given motivations (or not) by the writers and producers. They can give a character green skin or walk on their hands or become fish or do any bizarre thing. Are they doing the right thing by the character or by the audience? It's a matter of debate; in this case the answer is "no" on both counts. When I got to see the George and Emily relationship I considered it secondary to the main game and purpose of the show - a minor subplot. Their relationship develops in a haphazard and tentative way with Emily being the dominant personality and being a medical doctor (woman or not) in the late 19th century/early 20th century she would have come from a middle-class to upper middle class background and would have had some independent financial means from her family. Some events during the show seem to indicate she is from a middle class background. A real Emily would have seen a real George as not ‘top drawer’ and not worthy of her serious attention and her family would have likely thought that way too. That would have put limits on her relationship with George. It takes a strong person at any time to see beyond conventions and limitations. George as a junior policeman and of working class origins is in awe of her, and attracted to her, woos and eventually takes the bull by the horns and kisses her and she responds. The Emily I watched basically toys with George and is then miffed when George walks away when she kisses Leslie Garland. She seems to want George, and, I think he wants her, but that’s not allowed to develop or happen. If they were real I'd say they were too afraid to take the leap. Looking at it from start to finish they are strongly attracted to each other and she is devastated when George is sent to prison. They part as friends when she leaves, there is a great tenderness that speaks of more than friendship, and to me an undertone of regret and of not all bridges being burned beyond hope of repair. Now, Emily Grace and Lillian Moss. In the real world these sorts of relationships existed; read, Lillian Faderman's, Surpassing the Love of Men: Romantic Friendship and Love Between Women from the Renaissance to the Present (1981, rev ed. 2006). Both women are likely from the same Victorian middle class culture, and therefore have shared values. Middle and upper class men also had similar relationships (e.g. in literature, Sherlock Holmes and Dr Watson). Their involvement in the early women's rights/votes movement indicates that - suffragettes were mostly women from upper and middle-class backgrounds. Women of that background had the time and the financial means to get involved in the movement, whereas their working class sisters were simply trying to get by. And their romantic relationship? possible with Emily as bisexual and Lillian as a lesbian, but I don't think they would have used or maybe even understood the terminology. Maybe it's easier and safer for Emily Grace to have a relationship with another educated middle class woman than a working class man. I didn't like Lillian the character much as she seemed shallow (a cardboard cutout) and in some vague way manipulative; certainly she and her lover/ex-lover did attempt murder of the admittedly murderous husband. In the end Lillian was a simple stereotype and the Emily and Lillian relationship was also a stereotype - a projection of 21st century stereotypes and the current TV and cinema trope of same sex relationships back to 1903, but others could say that of George and Emily; Julia and Murdock too. Writers and producers and the rest of us love our stereotypes! In the context and span of the show I think it was completely unnecessary and a silly 21st century indulgence by the writers who seem to have fallen prey to a fad seen in TV and movies of secret and surprise lesbian relationships as a way to titillate or shock the audience, and for a show to be seen in some way as contemporary and cool. I think the writers and producers project our erotic fantasies backwards in time. Then they had indulge themselves further and kill Lillian off, it would have better (to me) if they had both boarded ship for the U.K. The writers and producers treated most of their audience with contempt (not their intention, but that's what it feels like). They build both the Emily-George and the Emily-Lillian relationships and then with some glee demolish both in a very bizarre fashion, as I said above they decided to turn the characters into fish, paint them green and make them walk on their hands before killing everything off. What it did to me personally was to make me seriously disinterested in further viewing of the Murdock Mysteries. Me being in Australia and not in Canada leads me to think the writers and producers will not care one bit, that said, they should take more care of their Canadian core constituency. Perhaps, the Murdock Mysteries writing team has run out of ideas or the writers and producers were bored with it all after 9 seasons. Maybe the Murdock Mysteries has now "jumped the shark" as they say. Finally, I hope Emily comes back for an episode or four and she and George get together romantically (sentimental and conventional I know)! Not that I expect that to happen. However, I would like to see George seriously develop and fly on his own, if only the writers will let him. At times during my watching he reminded me of Batman’s Robin. Perhaps George and Murdock could go to Europe and the U.K and get mixed up with Secret Service Bureau (the forerunner to MI5 and MI6) and George be recruited as a courier. Better George goes by himself and gets involved in espionage and somehow encounters Emily and they have a grand (and sexual) passion in Europe, or better still Paris. Or Emily could come home and work for women’s rights and votes in Canada and be a doctor to the poor of Toronto, now that makes more sense to me, with George or not. But I hope it’s with George. Would hate to see the M.M. writing team make the same mistake twice. Now I am being whimsical and florid! Sorry for the essay. Had to get this out of my system.